When Muhlenberg College takes the mat Saturday, Jan. 17, at Kings Point for dual meets with McDaniel and Washington & Lee, it'll be the first time since the 2008-09 season the Mules will field a full 10-man lineup in a Centennial Conference meet.

That's a huge step forward for a program that has "competed" in dual meets with as few as two wrestlers over the last five years.

"The guys are amped up," first-year coach Shaun Lally said. "We have a team now."

After a strong first decade of the new millennium, Muhlenberg's wrestling program nearly disintegrated into dust.

Muhlenberg finished among the top four in the Centennial Conference tournament in eight of 10 years between 2000 and 2009, including three second-place finishes. The Mules had 22 NCAA Division III championship qualifiers over that span, including six All-Americans, most recently 149-pounder Rob Kein in 2009.

However, because of low numbers, the Mules have won just two dual meets over the past five years, and they've finished last in the Centennial Conference tournament in each of the last three years.

A year ago, the Mules had just eight wrestlers on the roster and never fielded more than four in a dual meet.

Things are looking a little bit brighter this year under Lally, a Parkland graduate who wasn't hired until mid-October.

The roster features 14 names, the most since 2009-10 (16). Eight of those 14 are freshmen, and the roster includes only one senior —- first-time collegiate wrestler Ian Gimbar from Saucon Valley, who won an individual title last weekend in the Long Island Open.

The energetic Lally, who recently turned 32, has enthusiastically accepted the challenge of building the Mules into a dominant Division III program. He started a wrestling club at Stony Brook in 2011 and oversaw its admission to the National Collegiate Wrestling Association, composed of schools where wrestling doesn't hold varsity status.

Last fall he was about to begin his third season with the Seawolves when he learned Muhlenberg was looking for a coach to replace Jake Calhoun, who suffered severe heatstroke at a wrestling tournament in Florida in June and was facing a liver transplant.

Lally, who hopes his part-time position becomes full time — "I work like it's full time" he quipped — jumped at the chance to return home and try to resurrect, or elevate, the program.

"I had built Stony Brook from the ground up, and I had a lot of personal attachments. But I used to live near Wegmans [in Allentown] and I used to jog past Muhlenberg on my training runs and wonder why there wasn't more buzz [in the Lehigh Valley] about the program there," Lally said.

"I've always felt this program was a diamond-in-the-rough," he added. "At Stony Brook [we started wrestling] with a minimal budget, no alumni, and we were able to accomplish things by thinking outside the box. Here, we have those resources. That's one of the things that drew me back.

"Look at its history — Dan Terpstra, [four-time conference champ from Bangor] Jason Rute [conference champ from Easton], A.J. Bucko [three-time champ from Northampton]. Now, we have two Pennsylvania boys on the roster, and they're our best wrestlers — Gimbar and [Wilson's Jaryd] Flank. We get two or three District 11 kids a year, all of a sudden we're talking about a Top 25 Division III program."

So far Muhlenberg's schedule has been dominated by tournaments, which Lally said have "introduced" his youngsters to college wrestling.

"They've made adjustments and they've been learning, progression," he said. "They've seen measurable results and that makes it easier to commit to the work needed to improve."

The Mules sent 10 wrestlers to the mat in their lone dual meet so far, a 25-17 loss to Southern Maine at the Grapple in the Garden in New York City on Dec. 21.

"It came down to heavyweight and he might've won, but we coached him to pin [need to win the match] and he got caught in some moves," Lally said. "But last year we lost to that team 59-0."

50 years of service: Kutztown will celebrate former head coach and school Hall of Famer Dan Hinkel's 50 years of service to the program before the Golden Bears' match with Seton Hill.

He will be honored at a noon gathering featuring free food and drink before the 2 p.m. match. He also will be honored with a pre-match ceremony with gifts and presentation of a scholarship in his name.

Hinkel served two stints as head coach, ending his second stint in 1995, and served as assistant coach to five head coaches. He recorded more than 100 career dual-meet victories as head coach, while numerous grapplers qualified for the NCAA Championships under his tutelage.

He was inducted into the KU Athletics Hall of Fame in 2003 and is a member of the Pennsylvania Chapter of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame and Lock Haven University Hall of Fame.

Bear on the prowl: Kutztown U. senior Ziad Haddad (Bethlehem Catholic), the reigning NCAA Division II heavyweight national champion and Division II wrestler of the year, is off to a 16-0 start this year that includes seven pins and seven major decisions.

Haddad, who began his collegiate career at North Carolina, has won 41 straight and is 68-5 at Kutztown. The Bears (6-5) are ranked 13th nationally and third in Super Region I behind Notre Dame of Ohio and Mercyhurst.

Rankings: Wins at Navy and Maryland, coupled with Edinboro losses to Virginia and Old Dominion at the Virginia Duals, enabled Lehigh to climb from No. 11 to 10 in the NWCA Division I poll. Edinboro, which was No. 10, fell to No. 15.

The Mountain Hawks, who are off this weekend, are ranked No. 13 in InterMat team rankings, up two spots, and No. 18 by Flowrestling.

Individually, Lehigh now has five ranked at their weight class now that Randy Cruz has slipped into No. 20 at 143. Others are Mason Beckman (No. 12, down two at 133); Mitch Minotti (up one to 14 at 157); Nate Brown (still third at 184) and Elliot Riddick (up two to 13 at 187). All but Cruz are ranked by Flowrestling: Beckman (10), Minotti (15), Brown (3) and Riddick (15).